Out of Season

Well, it certainly felt like the season had changed today - there was little sign that it had ever been Summer.  I was down on the coast again -  I had lunch on Calshot beach and it had that end-of-season feel.  The beach itself was deserted, the car parks empty and all the beach huts, (and there are some pretty impressive such huts on Calshot beach, the size of small houses in some cases), were either already shuttered or were in the process of being cleared out before being locked up.  The boats were all beached, some already loaded onto their trailers and being driven away.  Of all the beaches I visit during the Summer, Calshot is the one that shuts down earliest and most completely.  By the first week of September it has a melancholy feel - which I quite like.  It appeals to the depressive side of my nature.  To be fair, Calshot is never the busiest of beaches, partly due, I'm sure, to the fact that it is really just a very narrow strip of shingle, with a castle at one end.  But it is a great place to watch the ships coming and out of Southampton water.  It probably doesn't help that Calshot itself is only a small village, with little in the way of visitor amenities - the whole place is dominated by the outdoor activities centre (previously an RAF seaplane and flying boat base).

By contrast, beaches like Milford-on-Sea, Keyhaven and Barton-on-Sea are backed by larger villages, with shops, cafes and other visitor-friendly stuff.  Lepe, while being little more than a hamlet, is in the middle of Lepe Country Park and has an extensive visitor centre.  Consequently, it takes longer for the visitors to ebb away from these beaches, even after the schools go back.  Indeed, based on past experience, it is about this time of year that the pensioners start turning up in their camper vans.  Nevertheless, despite these new arrivals, it is clear that holiday season is winding down.  Even when the weather remains warm and sunny (as it often does into September), you can feel the change, the reduced number of kids about, the increasing age profile of the remaining visitors and the dwindling number of caravans and campers.  That jaunty holiday feeling ebbs away, to be replaced by something that feels more like a grim determination to at least go through the motions of still being on holiday.  But, as I noted earlier, overall, the feeling is one of melancholy, a wistfulness for the Summer which has just slipped by and the knowledge that we'll have to wait another year for its return.  As I get older, I get ever more reluctant to let go of Summer, with its illusion of youth and care free living.  This year, because of the disruption caused by Covid, it has been even more difficult to let it go.  But, sadly, we have no choice.